PayPal acquires iZettle in biggest acquisition ever

PayPal has agreed to buy iZettle, one of Europe's best-known financial technology startups for Dollars 2.2 billion, the companies said on Thursday.

Reports last month suggested that PayPal could be moving into supplying debit cards as it looks to expand its reach into the wider payments world.

iZettle was founded in 2010 with an aim to offer plethora of affordable financial services like point-of-sales and partner application to small businesses. The current CEO of iZettle, a company based on Stockholm, will report to the PayPal CEO and both companies want to improve the technological aspects of offline payments in many parts of Europe. The transaction ranks as the largest acquisition in PayPal's history, The Wall Street Journal reported. We understand that the two have been courting for years but PayPal has been playing hardball until its hand was forced.

Once complete, PayPal will have an in-store presence in 11 markets in Europe and Latin America.

Dan Schulman said in the statement, "iZettle and PayPal are a strong strategic fit, with a shared mission, values, and culture - and complementary product offerings and geographies". In today's digital world, consumers want to be able to buy when, where and how they want.

Meanwhile in the UK, Square is already in situ along with an increasing number of smaller players like SumUp.

iZettle CEO Jacob de Greer said: "Combining our assets and expertise with a global industry leader like PayPal allows us to deliver even more value to small businesses to help them succeed in a world of giants".

With iZettle, Paypal will have access to hundreds of thousands of brick-and-mortar retailers.

Under the terms of the deal, Zettle CEO Jacob de Greer and the company's management team will continue to lead the business, which expects to process Dollars 6 billion in payments in 2018 and have gross revenues of USD 165 million. The acquisition will expand PayPal in different countries such as France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Brazil, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Norway and Spain.

"By joining the PayPal family we'll become iZettle with superpowers and jump on a fast track to realise our vision".

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